Monolithic optical sources and associated control electronics are desired to assist in overcoming the barrier to practical, wafer-scale optoelectronic devices such as optical backplanes with a high data rate (>1 Gbit/sec). An advanced photonic mixed signal parallel interconnect transceiver would be suitable for multi-functional RF analog optical links and high-capacity digital data transmission for very short distance interconnections. While light-emitting devices monolithically formed with passive photonic devices are still in their infancy, the importance of having monolithically integrated components and fabrication methods to exploit their unique capabilities cannot be minimized.
Photonic crystals are materials that have a set of wavelengths that are forbidden to propagate in the crystal, i.e. a photonic bandgap, similar to the bandgap found in semiconductors. Photonic crystals, and photonic bandgap devices comprised of photonic crystals, have potential applications in the areas of high bandwidth, free-space or fiber-based, covert optical communication systems (modulation, beam-steering); surveillance (optical beam-steering); sensors (hyper-spectral filtering); and informational security (photonic logic and routing for encryption).
Optical waveguides can be fabricated within the photonic crystal by adding defects to the crystal so that a frequency in the photonic gap will be allowed along the defect. These photonic crystal waveguides can be made small with sharp bends, thereby decreasing the size of optical devices to a point where integrated optical circuits can be created. Photonic crystals may also be highly dispersive. At frequencies near the bandgap, the highly dispersive effects of the photonic crystal may be used to produce lenses or “super prisms”, where a small change in input angle results in a very large change in output angle for applications such as extremely high resolution sensors or beam steering.
The ability to monolithically integrate photonic bandgap devices and associated control electronics could assist in overcoming the barrier to practical, wafer-scale optoelectronic devices such as optical backplanes with a high data rate (>1 Gbit/sec). In addition, there is a growing requirement for a technology that is compatible with non-planar surfaces. Such devices could be affixed to curved surfaces, used in wearable computer systems, or for highly portable applications such as rolled-up devices. Current photonic bandgap materials are inherently planar in nature and non-flexible.
There is a need for a flexible photonic bandgap device that may be unrolled into deployment or conformed to non-planar surfaces to meet emerging applications for non-planar devices. Further, there is a need for such flexible photonic bandgap device to be free from power constraints imposed by limited power sources.